Art Of Money

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This is a really valuable affiliate tip, that is also slightly embarrassing.

One of the first hosting companies that I began using when first started working online was Hostgator. I like them. There are cheaper companies, since they don’t offer a “pay for a year, and save a whack of cash” deal like most companies do, but I’ve always been satisfied, so I’ve always promoted them as an affiliate.

I’ve made quite a few sales for them too.

Today, I was searching through Commission Junction, looking for hosting offers for my new blog setup service site, and was surprised to find Hostgator as one of the hosting companies in their system.

You see, since I signed up as a client with Hostgator, I was given an affiliate link with them as part of my client account.

Here’s the rub, if I use the link I received from Hostgator as their client, I get $50 per referral.

If I use the link from CJ, the payout is $100!

It never even occurred to me companies would run different affiliate payout offers through competing affiliate management sites. When you run a search inside CJ for “hosting” offers, you’ll understand why they do it. The search returns many offers and most publishers will simply sort by payout. The only way to get noticed is to have a high payout.

The first take-away is to shop around for affiliate offers, even to the point of looking for the same company in different affiliate marketing networks.

The second take-away is to use link management software or domains for your affiliate links, so if you do change the offers you are promoting, you can do it in one place and update all the links on your site(s).